HERE IS YOUR SNEAK PEEK! Chapter 21 When I woke up on December 9th 2013, I knew the time had come. It was instinctive; a sense that, though I felt unimaginably sad, this was the right day, the right instinct, and that it would be the right thing for Molly. It was a thirty mile trip to Pratt, and Dr Dorman’s vet clinic, and as I loaded Molly into the car I sang to her to take her mind off her pain, and chatted to her all the way there. I told her how proud I had always been of her, reminisced about all the adventures we’d had together, and thanked her for helping so very many people, and for touching and connecting with so many hearts. She was loved by so many, and I wanted her to know that. I also wanted her to know that she had truly saved my life, and how she gave my parents what I could not. I also thanked her for being bed side with me when both Dad and Mom passed. (Aug 20th six years to the date) It helped, all the talking. It help me keep focussed, but no pet owner can do what I knew I had to do without crying and as we turned into the park place outside Dr Dorman’s the tears were already springing in my eyes. My eyes were dams filled with over 14 years of joy, sadness, and most of all pride. My Molly had lived a life of a Princess with a Joker at her side. She was be released into the land of freedom, and I knew Mom and Dad would waiting for her. I carried her in. The lobby was decked with Christmas decorations and in the corner stood a small artificial tree. It was a bad time to be doing this. Dr Dorman was arranging dog food on a shelf when I came in, carrying my bundle. ‘It’s Molly,’ I told her. ‘It’s time.’ She nodded silently. And the look in her eyes confirmed I’d been right to come down. It was time. It was the right thing to let her go. A natural disaster has effects that are visible and measurable, and ones that happen more in heart and head. But another thing happens when a town gets blown away, and it’s that mother nature sidles up and slips back in. With the residents of Greenburg living in the middle of the great prairie of Kansas, the city limits weren’t just a series of marks on a map, they were also the point at which life became organised, and the wild critters weren’t allowed in. But once there was no longer a dog on every corner in town to tell Mr Coyote to ‘get the hell out’, all kinds of wildlife began moving in. Not just coyotes, but wild pheasants, snakes, quail and foxes - all of them anxious to gain some sort of foothold over the remains of the empty home lots. It was a while, then, before the humans sent them all on their way again, but even then, there was still a rolling population of feral cats. We had our own; they lived and raised their kittens in the woodpile in the back yard and had been there pretty much as long as we had. They kept their distance from me and the house, but they always seemed to like Molly, creeping out from beneath the lumber when she went out to do her business, often sitting in a circle near her, seemingly unafraid of her, specially during the last chilly winter, when she was getting so old that she went out to do her business and wobbly, uncertain legs and when more than once I’d had to rescue her from a snowdrift. I got home from Dr Dorman’s, hollowed out and heartsick, wondering what the heck to do with myself. I could hardly see for tears, hardly pull myself together, hardly think beyond the moment I’d been so dreading so long – but at the same time had been playing over and over in my head. The moment when, as I cradled Molly on that cold metal table, I heard Dr Dorman tell me quietly ‘Matt, she’s gone.’ And there the woodpile cats were, sitting on my deck, like they knew Molly had passed. As if sitting on my deck - something they had NEVER done before - was the most natural thing in the world. To say goodbye? To say hello? To say ‘we’re here for you now, Matt’? I didn’t know. I didn’t care. I was just glad they were there. And now there was work to be done.
Posted on: Tue, 09 Dec 2014 17:13:53 +0000